Apple makes major announcement on adding jobs in U.S.

Apple will be hiring tens of thousands of employees in the U.S., as they plan major investments in support of the American economy. According to a press release, the investments will be focused on three key areas: employment by Apple, spending with U.S. companies, and fueling the app economy.

According to Apple, they are responsible for creating and supporting over 2 million jobs across the United States. They expect to “generate even more jobs as a result of the initiatives being announced today.” Those initiatives include plans to spend more than $350 billion over the next five years.

Apple will be hiring and spending money to invest in existing campuses, as well as building a new facility, whose location has yet to be announced. The new facility will house customer support employees. The release says:

Apple expects to invest over $30 billion in capital expenditures in the US over the next five years and create over 20,000 new jobs through hiring at existing campuses and opening a new one. Apple already employs 84,000 people in all 50 states.

Combining new investments and Apple’s current pace of spending with domestic suppliers and manufacturers — an estimated $55 billion for 2018 — Apple’s direct contribution to the US economy will be more than $350 billion over the next five years, not including Apple’s ongoing tax payments, the tax revenues generated from employees’ wages and the sale of Apple products.

Apple is increasing the size of the [Advanced Manufacturing Fund ] from $1 billion to $5 billion. The fund was established to support innovation among American manufacturers and help others establish a presence in the US. It is already backing projects with leading manufacturers in Kentucky and rural Texas.

Apple also plans to do more to support coding education as well as programs focused on Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math (STEAM).

“The iOS app economy has created more than 1.6 million jobs in the US and generated $5 billion in revenue for American app developers in 2017,” the release says. “With demand for coding skills stronger than ever, today there are more than 500,000 unfilled programming-related positions across the country, and the US Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that by 2020 there will be 1.4 million more software development jobs than applicants qualified to fill them.”

Apple hopes that with the creation of Swift, “a powerful yet easy-to-learn coding language,” the free Swift Playgrounds app and a free curriculum, that gap will close.

“Apple is a success story that could only have happened in America, and we are proud to build on our long history of support for the US economy,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “We believe deeply in the power of American ingenuity, and we are focusing our investments in areas where we can have a direct impact on job creation and job preparedness. We have a deep sense of responsibility to give back to our country and the people who help make our success possible.”

Already the largest US taxpayer, Apple also says it anticipates making repatriation tax payments of approximately $38 billion, due to recent changes to the tax law. “A payment of that size would likely be the largest of its kind ever made,” states to the press release.